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Transportation Privacy

Class Action Accuses Toyota of Illegally Sharing Drivers' Data (insurancejournal.com) 49

Posted by EditorDavid from the you'll-never-drive-alone dept.
"A federal class action lawsuit filed this week in Texas accused Toyota and an affiliated telematics aggregator of unlawfully collecting drivers' information and then selling that data to Progressive," reports Insurance Journal: The lawsuit alleges that Toyota and Connected Analytic Services (CAS) collected vast amounts of vehicle data, including location, speed, direction, braking and swerving/cornering events, and then shared that information with Progressive's Snapshot data sharing program. The class action seeks an award of damages, including actual, nominal, consequential damages, and punitive, and an order prohibiting further collection of drivers' location and vehicle data.
Florida man Philip Siefke had bought a new Toyota RAV4 XLE in 2021 "equipped with a telematics device that can track and collect driving data," according to the article. But when he tried to sign up for insurance from Progressive, "a background pop-up window appeared, notifying Siefke that Progressive was already in possession of his driving data, the lawsuit says. A Progressive customer service representative explained to Siefke over the phone that the carrier had obtained his driving data from tracking technology installed in his RAV4." (Toyota told him later he'd unknowingly signed up for a "trial" of the data sharing, and had failed to opt out.) The lawsuit alleges Toyota never provided Siefke with any sort of notice that the car manufacture would share his driving data with third parties... The lawsuit says class members suffered actual injury from having their driving data collected and sold to third parties including, but not limited to, damage to and diminution in the value of their driving data, violation of their privacy rights, [and] the likelihood of future theft of their driving data.
The telemetry device "can reportedly gather information about location, fuel levels, the odometer, speed, tire pressure, window status, and seatbelt status," notes CarScoop.com. "In January, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton started an investigation into Toyota, Ford, Hyundai, and FCA..." According to plaintiff Philip Siefke from Eagle Lake, Florida, Toyota, Progressive, and Connected Analytic Services collect data that can contribute to a "potential discount" on the auto insurance of owners. However, it can also cause insurance premiums to be jacked up.
The plaintiff's lawyer issued a press release: Despite Toyota claiming it does not share data without the express consent of customers, Toyota may have unknowingly signed up customers for "trials" of sharing customer driving data without providing any sort of notice to them. Moreover, according to the lawsuit, Toyota represented through its app that it was not collecting customer data even though it was, in fact, gathering and selling customer information. We are actively investigating whether Toyota, CAS, or related entities may have violated state and federal laws by selling this highly sensitive data without adequate disclosure or consent...

If you purchased a Toyota vehicle and have since seen your auto insurance rates increase (or been denied coverage), or have reason to believe your driving data has been sold, please contact us today or visit our website at classactionlawyers.com/toyota-tracking.
On his YouTube channel, consumer protection attorney Steve Lehto shared a related experience he had — before realizing he wasn't alone. "I've heard that story from so many people who said 'Yeah, I I bought a brand new car and the salesman was showing me how to set everything up, and during the setup process he clicked Yes on something.' Who knows what you just clicked on?!"

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader sinij for sharing the news.

Class Action Accuses Toyota of Illegally Sharing Drivers' Data More | Reply

Class Action Accuses Toyota of Illegally Sharing Drivers' Data

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  • In other news the Vatican confirms that the late Pope didn't apply for membership of the Lutheran church - or any other Protestant group - and that ursine faecal material is still being found in forests.

    • So I looked it up... Francis (then Bergoglio in Argentina) attended evangelical service, had bible reading sessions with the pastors, said focus should be on what they both agree on. Later as a Pope, he commemorated the 500th year of the Lutheran reformation, performing religious service together with the president of the World Lutheran Federation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

      • A lot of red flags to 'real' Catholics

        'Communicatio in sacris. All active participation in the religious services of non-Catholics, whether Christians or not, is a sin forbidden by divine law.'

        https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.... [blogspot.com] is a remarkable statement of hard line conservative Catholics believe. I didn't think they were still out there!

        • There's nothing "conservative" about this "catholicism", it is just another sect that broke off against the canon from the only true Christian faith - the Orthodox church.

          Allahu Ackbar!

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by KGIII ( 973947 )

          A lot of red flags to 'real' Catholics

          I'm confused...

          First, I'm not a Catholic. I'm also not a believer in any deities of any kind. However, generally speaking, I'm not a dick about it - and I like to at least understand religions and belief systems. If anything, I'd describe myself as a 'horrible Buddhist'.

          So, I mean no disrespect with this post.

          Wouldn't a 'real' Catholic believe that the Pope is God's representative on Earth? So, if he was trying to find common bonds with other faiths, isn't that God's will manifest on Earth?

          Even if it's diff

          • Wouldn't a 'real' Catholic believe that

            That's just because these guys are nuts. They're against euthanasia and abortion, BUT in favour of capital punishment ("for the protection of the moral order"). Fking authoritarians.

            Of course death penalty has existed for long time, and was accepted by the primitive Church. But if they go that way, then they should also accept abortion, which was at the time allowed until 40 days (until the soul enters the body of the unborn baby).

            "No member of the faithful must be allowed with impunity to express public di

            • common bonds

              Ah right I misread, yeah I agree!

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Tyr07 ( 8900565 )

              [quote] That's just because these guys are nuts. They're against euthanasia and abortion, BUT in favour of capital punishment ("for the protection of the moral order"). Fking authoritarians. [/quote]

              Yeah, so you're mad that people want capital punishment when someone does something absolutely horrible, but you're comparing that to killing an innocent life before it's born?

              You're not against authoritarians, you just want to make sure you are one. Most people don't to truly stop exploitation, they just want t

              • I just say they're inconsistent. The logical options are:
                * Human life is scared as the Catholic Church is saying. No abortion, euthanasia, suicide, death penalty. Consistent!
                * "old things good, new things bad" which they invoke everywhere in their text, justifying death penalty as something that used to be accepted and needs to be accepted again by the Catholic Church. Alright as long as they accept abortion, as the early Christians would.
                * accepting both death penalty and abortion, but strangely it's not v

                • scared -> sacred

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by KGIII ( 973947 )

                  You could also argue that you're not being authoritarian but rather ceding authority to the people involved.

                  That's what pro-choice is in a nutshell.

                  Their trying to paint you as authoritarian is illogical and holds no real water.

                  You could point out that the very definition of 'life' is that it can sustain itself. A fetus can not survive on its own. There is no scientific evidence of a 'soul' or 'afterlife'.

                  Their 'ogic' has no merit.

                  HOWEVER...

                  There is the conundrum of late-stage abortion. While EXCEEDINGLY RA

              • You're not against authoritarians, you just want to make sure you are one.

                Words have meaning. Authoritarian means society imposing its will onto individuals. In their text, they say: no public criticism of Catholicism, and imply death to those who challenge moral order. These are authoritarian.

                Abortion laws aren't imposing a society will onto unwilling citizen. Because Abortion law applies to women, and they do not oblige women to anything. You certainly can choose to say abortion laws are barbarian (because they allow women to dispose of the fetus), but they aren't authoritarian

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Tyr07 ( 8900565 )

            Most religious people are much more grounded, and no one follow the bible to the letter, things change with the era as people learn and improve.

            Extremists are extremists, period, they'll use ideology, religion, past grievenances, even if it's their great, great, great, great ancestor and they don't even know what really happened, greed, anything really.

            With the amount of people who aren't extremists that are religious or not religious, different ideologies, etc, you can't say being religious or belief in X

  • Big, bold words are needed (Score:3)

    by quonset ( 4839537 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @06:44AM (#65352971)

    What is needed is a law which says for situations like this, or anything similar, companies need to have this wording in big, bold letters so it is clearly visible, and the words need to be unequivocal so there is no misunderstanding what is taking place.

    I realize in the current regime, where fraud and corruption is part and parcel, this isn't a big deal, but perhaps in the future there should be some form of government oversight where companies are held responsible for these "oversights" and, like a light switch, this data stealing can be turned off.

    • >"like a light switch, this data stealing can be turned off."

      I think there should be delayed, positive confirmation when location/tracking/telemetry/behavior data is collected or shared. A single click on something shouldn't be all there is when it is this serious.

      • Re:Big, bold words are needed (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Escogido ( 884359 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @07:36AM (#65353001)

        I think there should be even more than that. Users should be clearly notified that "data is being collected and transmitted", similar to how phones indicate that the microphone or camera is active. There should also be a way for users to see exactly what data is being sent, and the option to stop or opt out whenever they have a right to, which is often the case.

        • Like an email summary every month.
          • Imagine Facebook, Google, Apple and all the others who actually make a lot of money from this data sharing, sending you a monthly report. like: We made a couple of millions selling your location information. Thank you!
        • This like this will be done until there is some demand destruction from it. People keep buying it, it'll continue to get worse. You can mandate this, but trying to improve products through laws or legislation is the wrong approach. If a product isn't designed how a customer wants, they should say no. The invisible hand of economics says a competitor will see an opening if enough people want a telemetry-less car. Farm tractors built 50+ years ago were designed so the customer could rebuild the entire machine

          • Re:Big, bold words are needed (Score:5, Insightful)

            by stabiesoft ( 733417 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @10:02AM (#65353301) Homepage
            Nice theory. I think the problem is

            A. People need transportation, alternative is walk or ride a bike in many areas without mass transit.

            B. People are very short sighted. I always use the example of airline tickets. Almost universally, people buy on price. They don't look at if United's flight has .2" more legroom than American's. Similarly, for auto's, if Toyota's is 2 grand less than the Nissan for about the same size/trim level, they get the Toyota. There has been some customer pushback on very visible stuff like heated seat and remote start subscriptions. But info stealing is not visible until too late.

            C. There is already some pushback at current price points. Auto fleet if I remember right is now averaging 13 years old. That says there are many 20 year old cars on the road today because people can't afford current prices. Much like phones, the auto makers are desperate to find ways to keep/increase profitable without raising prices. Solution is pre-installed apps like phones. One of those pre-installed apps is tracking.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by KGIII ( 973947 )

        While the sharing (at least like we see in this instance) is relatively new, our cars have been recording information about our driving since as early as the 1990s.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

        The disturbing part (to me) is that this data has been recorded since the 90s, and we STILL don't have clear ownership of the data. It can, has, and will be used against you in a court of law.

        In the linked article is a bit about something I'd presumed based on my conversations with other people. The reality is tha

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by gtall ( 79522 )

      If is almost as if we need a Consumer Protection Bureau.

      • Re: (Score:1, Troll)

        by buck-yar ( 164658 )
        Or people could say "I don't like that, they won't get my money." We need to encourage a culture of doing your research instead of trusting in authority. You say we need an agency, but where were they on this? Do you know how ineffective govt usually is? How can they be depended upon to ensure every product is up to customers standards? That's the customers job and only they can do it well.

        • Re:Big, bold words are needed (Score:4, Informative)

          by stabiesoft ( 733417 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @10:10AM (#65353325) Homepage
          Gov has been pretty effective. Over the decades they have managed to all but eliminate child labor, cleaned up rivers/air, cut fatal work accidents, .... How quickly we forget how LA as an example has cleaner air with more people than in the 60's as an example. Or how many rivers you can now fish in again. Or how about something as simple as a mortgage. Laws have made it much harder to trick a person. Yes it is always good to do research, but for the couple with 2 kids, a house, 2 jobs, how can they have time to research everything? You simply do not have time to do a water test every time you get water from the faucet.
        • You say we need an agency, but where were they on this?

          First, the CFPB only dealt with financial issues. I say dealt because even though it was changing how financial institutions worked and holding them accountable, they were whacked by DOGE because they were stopping financial shenanigans and standing up for the people. Can't have that.

          Second, you do your research and find out every car manufacturer is sending your data whether you like it or not. Now what? Who are you going to complain to and

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Anonymous Coward

          >I don't like that invisible thing kept hidden from me

          The ever-unreachable idea of the free market (not unlike "well it's never actually done right" political systems) has many requirements, including consumers having information.

          The invisible hand doesn't help with cheating. Well, that may not be the best phrasing - if anything an invisible hand would encourage such deck-stacking.

    • Re:Big, bold words are needed (Score:5, Informative)

      by Inglix the Mad ( 576601 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @09:05AM (#65353165)
      Cue the right-wing echo chamber: "WHY YOU HATE CAPITALISM?!?! YOU A LIBRUL?"

      Cue the right-wing politicians screaming, "WE REFUSE TO SUPPORT EBIL BIG GUBBERMINT OVERREACH OF GLORIOUS JOB CREATORS! CONSUMER CHOICE!"

      Meanwhile normal people are treated like slime by large corporations with near zero oversight.

    • What is needed is a legally mandated setting in the infotainment system which is easy to set and opts out of all data transmission at any time.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by excelsior_gr ( 969383 )
      No, what we need is the location of the transmitting chip and soldering iron.

    • There is law that requires certain financial documents: 15 U.S. Code 1632.

      Let that be expanded to more common disclosures that are required or protected by law. As if anything is more common that a credit card statement or application.

  • For all of these data consent agreenments, the collector (totoya) should , in addition, have to show the blob of data gathered and issue a consent request to the customer for that and every data blob to share, indicating the nature of the data, timelapse of it and the receiver of the data. So let's say thay every year, Totoya asks the customer for a permission to send the collected data during that year.

  • Used vehicles... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by msauve ( 701917 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @08:13AM (#65353041)
    Even if a buyer of a new vehicle agrees, what procedures do they have in place to avoid collecting info on the purchaser of a used vehicle, who has never agreed to data collection? Even if they track registration/VIN info, that lags from the actual sale and may not reflect all sales, so might be associated with the previous owner. And how are they going to stop the vehicle from sending data? If they can remotely turn it off, they can probably turn it on remotely. Simply not recording the received data is insufficient.
    • If I had to deal with this I’d find and disable the cellular antenna used to actually communicate but it’s sad that’s what it’s come to. Some vehicles start spazzing when they can’t contact home and try over and over and over creating unnecessary drain and a dead battery in about a week or two. In that case I’d add a relay that physically removes its power source when the vehicle is off.
    • Not a lawyer but aren't we legally prohibited from reverse engineering the software in the car? If right to repair laws were passed, the free market could come up with a solution. Maybe its cut a trace with a razor. Maybe its upload a fix via clamp-on programmer. Its likely not physically impossible to defeat their data collection, but right now you might have to do a physical fix because tampering with the softare is illegal due to intellectual property laws

      • "Not a lawyer but aren't we legally prohibited from reverse engineering the software in the car?"

        Not for the purpose of interoperability, which is explicitly protected by the DMCA.

    • When I bought a one-year-old Toyota from a Toyota dealer, I was able to opt out of their data sharing. But it required creating a profile, downloading their app, and navigating to some buried preference settings. It was not intuitive. And I only knew about the problem because I also own a fairly new Chevrolet that had the same data sharing issue (and required similar opt-out steps).

      And that is a problem. It should be an opt-in process that is presented when the vehicle ownership changes hands. And it s

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by msauve ( 701917 )
        You only have to opt-out if you agreed to opt-in in the first place. If you didn't opt-in, they don't have permission. And what about private party sales?
  • We just bought a new Rav4 and while signing all the paperwork our salesperson went out of his way to point this particular "trial" out to us and tell us why we didn't want it. It was hidden in all the other trial memberships like the Toyota app, roadside service, sos service etc.
    • This is why it’s best to opt out of everything possible. Those “trials” are all abusive whether it’s selling your data or signing you up for repeated monthly payments they hope you don’t notice or worse.
    • Kudo's to that sales guy/dealership.

  • There’s barely any part of US life free of t (Score:4, Interesting)

    by shilly ( 142940 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @10:05AM (#65353305)

    And by this, I don’t mean merely the invasion of privacy described in this article. I mean things that make ordinary people’s lives shittier that are treated as really hard problems to solve because you don’t use the obvious tools to solve them that other countries use. People in Europe walk safely on and across the streets, can be treated for serious illness without risking bankruptcy, never once worry about being shot, eat safe food, don’t confront militarised police or have to do ridiculous field sobriety tests if they’re pulled over, etc etc. The US has got itself in to the most insanely state of anti-people uselessness and shows only signs of deterioration, not recovery. It’s so sad to see.

  • No meaningful consent asked (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sinij ( 911942 ) on Monday May 05, 2025 @11:52AM (#65353649)
    When I recently purchased a new Toyota, sales critter clicked through and accepted everything before delivery. They do that to collect sign up bonuses from the manufacturer. It took me hours on the phone with the corporate to retract consent and opt out. More so, I didn't trust them to actually do the opt-out, as support people on the call did not appear to have training in how to do it. Even after opt-out, I confirmed with wireless sniffer that the car sends out some data.

    In the end, I had to disassemble dash, find the telematics module (called Data Communications Module) and disable the cell modem on it. All this hassle ON TOP of paying ridiculous Toyota MSRP. To make things worse, Toyota disables all remote start, even using the key fob, when cell connection disabled. Fuck Toyota, never buying another one again.

  • Is there a site that keeps track of which products are tracking what, what is "opted in by default" and how easy it is to opt out of and disable it? I'd like to make sure my money goes to the least shitty option, since we hardly get shit-free options in the US with no data privacy laws / enforcement.

  • It would be great if the government mandated the manufacturers grant the ability to put a vehicle into "airplane" mode so it can't talk to anything else without the owner's consent.

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